B r e a t h f o r m e
by Lilvae
Summary: In the midst of a brewing war between all rogue organizations and the Great Nations, Sasuke and Sakura's paths cross, on opposing sides. Sakura's on orders from Naruto, the Hokage, to kill Sasuke on sight as he is now the leader of the sound and his level of treachery surpasses the point of return. After all of her hard work to harden herself, can she really kill him? sasusaku


Okay.. soo I have no idea if anyones going to read this,  
but I've been reading fanfiction again lately and had a story kinda in my brain. So here's my attempt at my first story in years. [My old account is since lost in the fray, as are the horrid stories I wrote.]

I have NO idea when this story takes place among the canon world.  
For now just assume whatever you want. I'm kinda just creating this as I write.

Just a warning, this will be rated M eventually if this is something that gets a decent amount of feedback. I'll see how well the first chapter is received before continuing. This will also be dark at first,  
but I promise it'll get better.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

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Chapter 1; Prologue.

_The fragrance of the wet earth and blood surrounded her, infiltrating her nostrils aggressively. The cold raindrops falling from the darkening sky were pelting the side of her face that was upturned to it. Her eyes were open but her vision was failing, and she could no longer feel her legs or hands. Her breathing was shallow, and with each inhale it was getting harder and harder to remember just how to perform the simple motion. She could feel the hot, sticky liquid dripping out of her side, sliding down her exposed stomach. Her lips twitched upwards at the sides as the darkness finally started to creep into her vision, flirting with her. Taunting her to give in and be at peace._

_She wanted so, so badly to just sleep. For it all to be over. The fighting. The pain. The loss. The grief. The heartache. If she had known this would be her life, would she have chosen all those years ago to enter the academy? What would her life be like as a simple civilian, like her parents? Would she be happy? Would she have found love? Would she have gotten the chance to be a wife, be a mother?_

_Suddenly, flashes were starting before her half lidded eyes. They were fuzzy at first, old memories that were long locked into a place in her mind far away. Her best friend and long time rival. They were sitting in the flower field, making bouquets as children. Another memory flashed of the chunnin exams when she cut off her ponytail to prove a point. Then Naruto came into view, his big, contagious and goofy grin. His vows to protect her. His vows to bring him back. The memories seemed to cycle through everyone important in her life, Kakashi-Sensei, Tsunade-Shishou, Rock Lee, Sai, her parents, and finally.. him. She felt her heart squeeze as a picture of a 12 year old Sasuke came into focus. His cold eyes, stoic expression. His alert stance. He was always so on edge when they were younger. The picture shifted to when he blew up part of Orochimaru's hide out after they had been searching and searching ruthlessly for him. She could see herself running hurriedly through the hallway to the burst of light leading to the blast site. She saw herself grab Sai and for a moment could almost feel her anger from that moment. The memory went to slow motion as she followed Sai's gaze upward, it was agonizingly slow even in her death like state. After what felt like days, her eyes finally locked on him in the memory, and she felt the rush of emotions, only seemingly more intensified than when she had been in that moment. The pain. The heartache. The guilt. She marveled in his beauty, the wind playing with his raven locks. His sharp, strong chest and muscled stomach that were shown from the opening of his shirt. her lips finally curved into the slightest smile, content with this being the last thing she saw, even if it was just a memory._

_'Looks like I can't keep my promise to Naruto after all..'_

_Her vision was pulsating from complete darkness to the light from the sunrise coming over the mountain looming above the battle area. A sound was going in and out of focus in her ears._

_'sak...u...ra?'_

* * *

He stood high on top of the moment that overlooked the clearing below, which held a scene of brutality. An all out war had been initiated by the increasingly bold moves concerning all rogue ninja, Akatsuki at the full front of it all. Rogue organizations banded together to take down the Great Nations, each for their own motives but couldn't do alone. So they came to a compromise. They would disband the Great Nations and divide them again amongst eachother. Akatsuki however, only agreed to the negotiations if they were assumed the world leaders. So long as the other organizations did not foil with whatever plans they had going, they would not intervene or rule what they did.

Following his masters death, he was given role of the Snake king. Orochimaru became weak and careless, his followers sensing this either fled to other organizations or plotted to rebel him and bring back the strength the Sound once used to be, and they succeeded. After the Sannin's death, word had spread fast and their ranks began to increase past even the enormity that it used to be. Kabuto had assumed the role at first, but as skilled and as vindictive as he was, he wasn't able to keep the organization in check. He approached Sasuke, and asked that he become leader. Swearing his allegiance to him, and only him until death parted them. After Orochimaru's death, Sasuke had taken leave with much of the other shinobi, but on his own. He traveled, but much to his dismay he no longer felt he had a purpose. His brother was gone, his leader was gone, even though he loathed him with every fiber of his being. He agreed, and with the events leading up to this moment, he was leading an army to gain the land he was promised, the land of fire. His home.

His crimson eyes scanned the carnage happening below. Surveying the bursts of chakra and the movements of the battle, as well as the surrounding treeline's as more and more shinobi of both sides came to join the fight. There were Shinobi of every kind, of every village and land participating. All except the ones, for some reason, he wanted to see. The Leaf.

Why haven't they shown up yet? Surely they hadn't all been wiped out yet. Some villages dwindled in numbers by this point, but the Leaf has grown quite strong in numbers over the years, and they were strong. A sudden smirk graced his lips as he thought about a certain loud mouthed ninja that had fulfilled his life long dream of becoming Hokage. Tsunade had stepped down and has since disappeared, her location dispite being heavily sought out in the recent times completely unknown.

He felt a presence approaching behind him, and kabuto appeared. He knelt down behind his master, his head tilted down in respect and his hand in a fist over his chest. "Lord-Sama, our troops on the outskirts identified Leaf Shinobi making their way here. ANBU, their elite squad. The one with the cat mask is leading them. Shall I send for more troops?" Kabuto looked up, his glasses shining in the moonlight.

His eyes hardened but never stopped watching the scene below. _'So, they sent their best to play. We'll see just how good they think they are.'_ He ripped his eyes away and turned around to face Kabuto, motioning with his hand and raising him up. "No, there's plenty of forces here to keep them at bay. The real fight isn't here anyway. Send word to the infiltration squad to move out."

"Right away, my lord." With a nod of his head, Kabuto bowed his head again, put his fist back over his chest and disappeared from view.

Turning back to the scene, he motioned to the shinobi surrounding him to take position and await the next impending attack. The medic disappeared, and he turned his face towards the sky, the smell of incoming rain heavy in the air.

* * *

The forest blurred past them as they made their way to the battle at blinding speed to aid their allies. Naruto had made the hard to decision to send his best, leaving the village a little less manned than he would have liked - but it had to be done. They were losing. Other villages were close to being wiped out, and more aid was needed. A dark feeling was swelling in the pit of the cat masked clad ANBU Captain.

_"Please, please make sure you come back safe. I can't lose you too." His eyes were shining with unshed tears, daring to fall._

_"I promise, Naruto."_

_"Promise me one more thing. If you see him... Kill him."_

Behind the mask, her teeth grit together and her brow furrowed. She had grown tremendously since their last meeting, surpassing her Sensei, and beyond that surpassing the legendary Sannin herself. But she wondered if even that would be enough against Sasuke. Word had spread fast that Orochimaru had died, and after Kabuto's failed leading attempts - the crown was passed to Sasuke. That was the moment that decided getting Sasuke back would forever be a failed dream, and so as his treachery grew, the decision to call for his death was made.

She had since come to terms with the decree, even though the love in her heart never faltered, she knew it would never be. Thus was the deciding factor to join the ANBU, to harden herself if, or rather when, the day should come that she had to face him. She would be ready.

Sensing the bursts of chakra up ahead, she signaled to her team to hold. Stopping on the branches high above the forest floor, she made more hand signs signaling their formation and strategy. In a blink the others had moved out, and broke through the shield of trees and got into their position. She made a few quick hand seals and created a henge as she always did in the face of enemies to conceal her most telling feature of her identity, her long, pink hair bled to black.

* * *

He stood in silence, watching the forest like a hawk from his perch. It seemed like time had slowed and was dragging, until finally the presences he had been awaiting burst through the treeline. They took up a defense position which consisted on the shinobi making an inner and outer ring formation, with their medic in the middle along with another ANBU. The team already emitted a dangerous aura, and the rogues on the battlefield turned their attention to the newcomers while the allies of the leaf gathered themselves and their wounded, trying to regroup.

Although, the cat mask wearer was nowhere to be seen. Stories of this particular ANBU captain ripped through the lands. The captain was smart and calculating, some say she could see into the future - the way she anticipated and seemed to know exactly what was going to happen next. She was highly skilled, and could manipulate every chakra element there was due to complete control over her chakra which made her dangerous. Above all else, she was ruthless. She had never failed an assassination or mission to anyones knowledge. Sasuke could feel an unfamiliar feeling of excitement to meet such an opponent, it had been a long time since he had a challenge.

As the enemy forces readied themselves, a few from the other organizations got a little too cocky and blazed ahead, weapons drawn and hand seals being made as a barrage of attacks made its way towards the circle formation of ninja. Three from the outer ring stepped forth to block the incoming attacks and quickly finishing off the weakest links first. Seeing that their formation had slightly broken, or so they thought, a wall of shinobi progressed forward to attack, and that was their first mistake. As they drew closer, one of the ANBU made the necessary seals for Katon: Shoumeidan no Jutsu, a very weak flare technique unusual for an ANBU to use. He tilted his head back and instead of casting his attack at the incoming ninja, he blew it straight into the air. The other two that had broke from the formation also created earth style hand seals, slamming their palms into the ground creating Doton: Taju Doryuheki (Mupltiple Earth-style Wall) creating a barrier around the members of the formation. Before anyone could understand that the fire was a signal, she had already pounced into action from the tree line, gathering chakra into her fist as she flew over the barrier created by her comrades, and coming down HARD and shoving her fist through soil and rock and crumbling the earth from out beneath the feet of the incoming attackers. All while the ground was breaking, she was also feeding her chakra into the ground to control just how it broke, skillfully moving the earth to englulf and swallow the rogues who couldn't get out of the way in time. Screams and the sound of crunching bones echoed and filled the clearing.

Behind her, the walls of the outer wall barrier cracked and crumbled down. Out of the corner of her eye she watched it happen, and held her breath as the inner wall started to crack slowly, but thankfully stayed intact, which means her team did also. It was a risky plan, but it had worked. She had already successfully taken out a more than half of the enemies forces with one blow. She smirked in satisfaction behind her mask and averted her attention back to the still standing threats across the rubble and chaos.

_'Amazing.'_ He thought, reveling in the sight before him. Not even phased about his numbers already dwindling at an alarming rate. He rested his hand on his sheathed katana on his side, his legs screaming at him to join the fight. Instead, he took to a crouching position, at the ready to leap into action when he deemed fit, his crimson eyes trained on her. She was the star of the show unfolding before him and he just wanted to watch for a little longer.

Before any composure could be made from the blow, her team sprung into action and the fight began. Weapons clashed, beasts made of chakra collided. It was chaos. His eyes stayed trained on the kunoichi who jumped to the front, unsheathing her twin katanas and seemingly danced with them. Amidst the slaughter she was a thing of beauty. Her long, dark hair flowing around her fluidly as she moved, her precise foot movements to push her in whatever direction she wanted to go in in a split seconds notice. With his crimson eyes he could see the chakra she flowed into her body, helping her to bend, morph and twist for her dodges and attacks. She slashed through bodies, severing limbs and never missed a beat. She was everything they said about her, ruthless to the core.

As the battle raged on, the ANBU pushed through strong, although losing member after member. The enemy numbers also dwindled dangerously. This was Konoha's most elite team, after all. He expected nothing less, but what he didn't expect was her. It was something to hear about her, it was another thing to see her. He was as close to mesmerized as the young Uchiha could get. She was still doing her dangerous dance, making her way through the ranks of shinobi who dared to step in her path.

Suddenly, a little distance away she felt an ominous presence appear from the cliffside, making himself known. A tingle ran over her skin and the darkness in her stomach swirled in both anticipation and delight. 'He's here..' She slashed through her last target before averting her body weight and jumped back, doing a graceful backflip through the air as her chakra infused feet planted themselves almost silently with the wall of rock her teammates had made. She scanned the area from the height she was at, her blades in a criss-cross position infront of her at the ready. Speedily assessing the situation before her to see what progress had been made while she was in the trance of bloodlust just moments before. Much of her team had fallen, medic included. She had four more of her team left, who were stuck in a matched battle with the last remaining handful of rogues left. All their chakra levels were low, and their stamina was failing them.

_'__They won't last much longer, but we came here and did what we needed to do. A good number of allied forces were able to escape and regroup.'_ Her eyes scanned the endless field of corpses, poking up from all angles from the earth she had shattered earlier. Until her eyes finally found him, standing at the base of the mountain, clad in black, his crimson eyes focused solely on her.

Jumping down from her position on the wall, the earth slightly cracked beneath her from the pressure of her feet. Bringing her blades down, she began walking towards him, and he towards her. Their movements went unnoticed to the battling shinobi on the other side of the clearing, which to her was another sign that they were all reaching their limits. Her feet continued to crack the earth with every step she made, her chakra presence was enormous and could almost make the air heavy. Once to the middle of the clearing, they stopped a mere 10 feet away from eachother. They stood their, studying eachother for a long while. Visibly, his eyes went from her head to toe. He smirked at the cracks underneath her feet from her power, sliding his eyes up her knee length black boots that had a slight heel to them, to her exposed skin of her creamy thighs. She wore a very light pink short skin that was open on each side to expose the black shorts she wore underneath. Her ANBU vest, unlike the rest, was black and cropped and she wore a crop sleeveless mesh shirt underneath, leaving her stomach completely exposed. Her arms were slender but toned, her hands were clad in black gloves, and she had the same color elbow guards as her skirt. His eyes trailed to her mask, which was the same porcelain white as the rest, but had black whiskers painted onto it and a diamond in the middle of the forehead. Her long black hair cascaded down her back and spilled over her shoulders to her hips. He inwardly cursed the mask for hiding what her face could have looked like.

He wasn't the only one looking him head to toe, although he wouldn't be able to tell due to how well the slits in the mask hid her eyes. He was taller, more filled out than the last time they had met. His posture was was alert, but relaxed at the same time. One arm hanging by his side, the other resting on his blade that was perched on his side. He wore black pants, wrapped at the bottom and down into his black ninja sandals. He bore the same purple rope as he had the last time they had met, only it circled his waist a few times endlessly and didn't seem to tie anywhere. His black shirt was slightly too big and open, again much like the shirt he had worn in their previous meeting, but there was a mesh shirt underneath slightly hiding his new physique. Her eyes rested at his collarbones, which were strong and much more evident than as a younger man. She ripped her eyes up, his raven hair had grown a bit longer and framed his face beautifully, still sticking up in the back as it always had. His face was stoic, and his eyes were cold - but she could see a hint of something in them. Curiosity maybe? She couldn't quite put her finger on it. After the long moments had passed, she shifted her henge to her voice to mask that as well.

"Uchiha Sasuke, traitor and deserter to Konoha, the village Hidden in The Leaves, I hereby sentence you to death."

The smirk played on his features once again as he unsheathed his katana, and stood at a battle ready stance. His dark, silky voice seemingly ripped through the air in his response. "Hn. I'd like to see you try."

They both lunged forward, and the clash of their blades echoed.

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A/N: Okaaay so I'm shaking the massive amounts of rust off. I don't think this was too terrible.

The first snippet is obviously after this battle scene, idk why I wrote it like that but I did.

But again I don't even know where this story is going, I really just had this first scene in my head..  
which is the prologue. So hopefully you guys like it and want me to build off it.

Much love.

-lilvae


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